Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Benefits of testing?

Having just joined this forum a couple of weeks ago, I have had an interesting time reading on here. In fact, I feel I have spent way too much time reading on here; hence my question.

From early on in my son's life, other people have asked me if I was going to have him "tested". I think to many that know him, it is pretty obvious that he is gifted to some extent. However, since I had always (since before he was born) planned on homeschooling, I didn't see the point. Yes, he is quick and intelligent, but what is the point of knowing "how much". But after so much reading, and my eyes being opened to the fact that there is such a broad range of gifted, and that every level of gifted has different needs, etc..I am starting to wonder if I should test him. Also, after so much reading, sometimes I start to wonder and second guess myself. Sometimes, I think, maybe he would be more normal, if my husband and I weren't such "nerd" parents that provided such strange things for our son to "study". Then I tell myself, that it is him, not us. I never told him to study about US presidents...he just found a book he had to have and then, wham, he knows it. But I still find myself questioning if he really is as bright as I think he is. Is this a good reason to test? Or are there other good reasons? With homeschooling being the plan until at least middle school, is there any point to testing now. Will it change how I go about homeschooling him - how hard I push, how much I let him direct the learning? For those of you that test your kids so young - what are your motivations outside of placement in public/private school? And what are the benefits to you and to your child?

BTW, he just barely turned five a couple of weeks ago, so he is technically Kindergarten-age in August. But when he turned five, I decided to actually start a bit of more structured homeschooling to get him used to it.

Thanks for you thoughts and help.

Hi Phey. I have always homeschooled, and struggled recently with whether to test, so I thought I would chime in.

My husband and I were both identified as gifted as kids, and we attended Ivy League schools. When I had my daughter, I naturally expected that she would be bright, but I wanted to avoid what happened me as a kid. I think partly because I was bullied and socially ostracized frequently in grade school, my identity as a "smart person" became very important to me. I didn't want to get invested in my daughter being anything other than who she was, and so I actually made an effort to actively avoid testing. (We applied for private K here before making up our minds to homeschool. Many of the local privates required IQ testing for K admission, and I made a point of NOT applying to any that had that requirement. It just seemed ridiculous to me!) I guess I was worried about my daughter "becoming a number," either to me, or in her own mind.

The homeschooling community in which I find myself is very wonderful and lively, and the dominant philosophy is an unschooling one. Better late than early, don't push, let kids unfold and blossom in their own time. Since I was homeschooling partly because I wanted to protect and foster unstructured play, this philosophy suited me very well, and we did very little formal schooling for the first several years. When I say very little, I mean maybe two hours per week through about 3rd grade. (My dd is now 10 and my ds is 8.) In this context, giftedness did not really have any meaning. My daughter read a ton, she played alone and with friends, we hung out at museums, etc.

Many people would comment on how mature she was, what an old soul she was, how great her vocabulary was. I always sorta chalked it up to homeschooling, and didn't think much about it. Then my daughter became good friends with a girl who is DYS, and the mom asked me about my dd being gifted, and I was like, huh? I just hadn't really thought like that before.

I suddenly found the idea pretty compelling, though, and have spent waaaay too much time on this board and other such places. I think I pretty quickly realized that, now that the early years of elementary are over, a gifted label could actually make a big difference in how we homeschool, and the community of homeschoolers with whom we associate. And it has.

I always knew that I would unschool less and less as my two got older, so even before this friend asked me about my dd, we were already doing more structured academics. One of the first sites I happened upon was JHU's Center for Talented Youth. I saw that they have some amazing online classes that could really offer a lot to our homeschooling, and so I had my dd take that test. She qualified, and we have been taking math classes there.

Here is one place where gifted identification has been really helpful to us. Before, I could never find a math curriculum we were happy with. We tried several, and she would be so bored within a few months, we always ditched them. I am a little chagrined to say that it didn't occur to me that she might need an accelerated approach. Since starting math through CTY, math has been going much better.

I then began to wonder about getting her formally tested. Well, okay. I became obsessed. Like you, I was just plain curious after doing so much reading. I thought that it might help me to understand her better, and to make decisions about curricula. Also, in a few years, we will be facing the high school decision, and I thought it might be helpful to know what we were dealing with.

After much back and forth, I did test, and it turns out she is HG+. I was really in the dark about how different she was from other kids. It has been helpful to know that. My dd is a lovely, calm, sweet kid who is very easy going, but tends to be slightly anxious. She suffers from task avoidant perfectionism, and it has been good for me to have a sense of her abilities so that I can present her with good, challenging stuff, and nudge her gently forward.

So I am really glad we tested, and we will hopefully be applying for DYS now, too. I will say that I am also really glad that this wasn't a burning question for me earlier. I am happy that we spent the first few years of her school time blissfully ignorant, with no pressure to perform, and just lots of open ended time to explore at her own pace.

By the way, there is a great homeschool resource called the gifted homeschooler's form. They have a website and a yahoo group. (Hope it's okay that I put that in here!)

Sorry this turned out to be so long. Hope it helps.

Wow. Thank you for your detailed insight. So, in a nutshell, would you wait till 6th grade to test? I like your mentality of letting them just be without stressing about everything. I've never before in my life worried about these issues, until I stumbled here. I don't want to over push; I'd rather he just enjoy childhood- BUT, at the same time, I see that my boy needs and wants to study and learn. We always laughed at how studious he was from a young age. I am now thinking maybe test conformation will allow me to say that it's okay to spend so much time studying for his age, because that is just who he is. He loves learning, and does it well. But should I wait?

Well, getting a certain number doesn't have to change anything that you do. I would say it didn't really change much in our lives, except that it opened me up to a world of possibilities in terms of online classes and curricular materials that I hadn't thought to look for before.

I suppose it could change your expectations of your son. It did change mine for my daughter, but not in a bad way. She so often psyches herself out, and tells herself she can't do something. Having the various test scores is a great reality check for us both.

I guess I am saying that the info itself isn't a bad thing. It's all about what you do with it. If it helps you understand your kid better, that's good, right?

Like I said, I'm glad it wasn't on my radar sooner, but I also think it's kinda hard to bury that curiosity if it's nagging at you. If I had been bitten earlier, I probably would have tested sooner, because I found it hard to wonder and not know.

Btw, just a plug for relaxed homeschooling, at least in the early years -- even though we did so little structured stuff, dd aced that out of level SCAT test for CTY. A bright kid can learn a lot from mud pies, woods walks, and lazy afternoons reading!

I think I've read on this forum that it's better to wait until at least age 6 to test as the results are more accurate. But, I don't have personal experience with that.

Good luck!

I'm not sure how helpful this will be, but our only reason for testing was to help her placement since we are not homeschooling. I felt that I needed the scores in order to be taken more seriously as we looked at other schools. Every parent thinks their kid is "smart" and "special" so for us, it was just something more objective to assist us.

We arranged for testing when my son was 6 because we had a feeling we needed to ask for acceleration with his teachers, and we wanted some data to bring to the table in our discussions, both as evidence for the teacher and to give my husband and me a sense of how much acceleration to ask for specifically.

if you can afford it test. It is exhausting second guessing yourself, wondering if you should be doing more, trying to change behaviors that are actually part of the giftedness etc. Get an answer, make appropriate plans, move on.

The over 6 thing depends on the test used. Sb5 and wj111 cog are ok before then. Just make sure your child can co-operate with the tester and is not too shy.

I would not have done my son any favours by assuming he was mildly gifted/high average when in fact he was at the top end of hg just because I thought it was wrong to test without good reason.

Thank you Puffin. I think that makes good sense. After much reading on here, I think I have decided to test (previous to learning about this forum, I was adamantly against it!) So now the question is, do I wait until he is six - Almost a full year? Also, I have no idea what this testing entails. How cooperative does boy need to be? - He varies greatly between being feisty and independent and only wanting to do things his own way-on his own time to being somewhat of a show-off and performing his best. But you can never pin it to a certain day. How long does testing take? Does he have to sit still and answer questions with a person? Or is is a computerized test? Is it written? - He is not much into writing stuff down at this age. In general what are these tests like and what sorts of things do they ask? I have no ideas whatsoever! Thanks for the help!